Alchemist In The Apocalypse: Rise Of A Legend!
Chapter 19 Reasons, Separation And Moving Out Alone With Anna

Reasons, separation and moving out alone with Anna.

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[Ace POV],

The man in front of me only stopped when he was a meter away from me.

I dragged Anna and moved a little backward to put more space between us and signaled for the man to speak out of caution given the strange things that were happening right now.

"There's no need to be this wary of us," the man said, continuing;

"I promise I don't mean any harm," he said.

'Well, I doubt you could in the first place,' I thought but didn't say anything as I continued to stare at him with a blank expression.

Seeing that he couldn't make me less wary of them, he had a helpless expression on his face before saying;

"Since I can't persuade you not to be wary of us, all I can do is thank you for your assistance," he said as I followed up with a question.

"What happened here?" I inquired, to which he replied;

"Where do you want me to begin?" "When did all these strange things start or when did this happen?" he inquired.

"Please start from the beginning," I replied because it would be more informative to me if he started from the beginning, depending on how honest he is.

"Then let's start from when we came out of that strange transparent crystal," he said before continuing his speech, looking at the three behind him.

"After coming out from the strange transparent crystal at the time and releasing the oppressive feeling, I was startled, surprised, and a little scared when I saw the scene in front of me and realized that I was in an unfamiliar place.

The first thing that came to mind was not me being kidnapped because if I had, it would have been an expensive joke because no kidnappers in their right mind would waste time decorating everywhere just to scare their kidnapped victims when they awoke.

The first thing that came to mind when I saw that everything was just green was that the apocalypse had arrived or that the world was coming to an end and we were returning to our creator's arms," he explained.

When he said that the world was possibly coming to an end or was currently experiencing an apocalypse, I slightly took in my surroundings again, thinking that perhaps the world had already experienced it as I continued to listen to the man in front of me.

"I was so scared, lost, and confused that I thought I was going insane and seeing things because there was no way the world could have turned into a forest overnight."

It just didn't make sense, but despite my fear, I had to forcefully shallow it and make my way forward, looking for anyone because the area I was in was devoid of people.

It didn't take long for me to replace people in the area, or should I say four people in transparent crystals with strange blue liquid in them.

The transparent crystal I saw looked exactly like the one I came out of, leading me to believe that this strange thing was not happening only to me unless kidnappers all over the world decided to start pranking the people they kidnap before selling them, which is impossible but not entirely impossible given that we live in a strange world where anything can happen.

At least, that's what I kept telling myself to calm down," he explained.

I was just listening to whatever he had to say at this point and didn't interrupt him because I didn't want him to start telling me what happened to him again, so I just helplessly listened to him as he went on.

Aside from the odd ideas he had swirling around in his head, at least I can tell that some of what he said was true because I personally experienced it.

"When I noticed the people in the transparent crystal moving a little, I moved to a distance far away from them but not too far as I observed them," the man said as I continued to listen to him.

I only focused my attention on what he was saying when he got close to what I wanted to hear.

"After the primordial chronicle appeared and stage 1 of whatever was going on began, the five of us were forced to fight an ape right away.

One of us got unlucky and had his insides eaten before he died, but it was because of him that we were finally able to kill the monsters and get the first kill rewards, which is how we got our equipment "He was about to finish speaking when I interrupted him with a question;

"What was the level of the monster you fought?" I inquired, and he replied that the monster's level was level 2.

'Level two?' I thought as I looked at the equipment in the hands of the people in front of me, and no matter how I look at it, the highest grade weapon in their hands is of blue quality, making me wonder how that was possible given that it was only a level below the monsters Anna and I fought.

They should at least have a weapon of a higher grade than blue, as far as I can tell, since blue is the best they currently have.

Or is it because there were so many of them that they banded together to kill the monster? Or because the monster's level was low while its primordial record was still distributed to many people, resulting in lower rewards?

Perhaps this is why our reward is higher?

'It appears that there are weak ones among the strong ones.'

I motioned to the man to continue after I finished my assumptions.

"After the monster died, we planned to take a break, which we did until we were attacked by something or someone we hadn't expected," he said, pausing before continuing.

"We were attacked by our comrade who died from the monster attack in the beginning," he explained, pausing to examine the zombie's body on the ground.

Hearing this, I was stunned, and a sudden thought entered my mind, followed by questions.

'The primordial chronicle wants to weed out the weak, but the deceased weak can't even rest as they turn into zombies,' I thought, wondering if zombies were the next thing we'd have to deal with in this new world.

Why didn't I consider whether being injured by a monster would turn a human into a zombie?

That's because I was also injured by the Asmodeus Serpent during the battle, and I didn't turn into a zombie, especially when the Asmodeus Serpent's blood touched me, with some of its blood entering my system.

But only if blood infection works in the same way as it does in zombie movies.

Looking at the man in front of me, who appeared to have aged more than his actual age, I asked him a question, saying;

"Was that zombie I just killed a human?" I asked, and the man I assume to be the group's leader nodded.

When I noticed this, I asked him another question;

"So, what's the next step?" I questioned him, and he took his time answering with a thoughtful expression on his face.

I had an idea of what he was going to say based on his expression, but I continued to listen anyway.

"I was wondering, since all of this strange stuff is going on, don't you think it would be better if we banded together and faced the challenges ahead?" I interrupted the man as he was about to continue speaking by saying;

"That would have been a fantastic idea, but I am not interested. Thank you for responding to my query ", I said as I dragged Anna's hand and moved in another direction because there was nothing else for me to do here.

When the people who fought the zombie in the beginning saw this, they were stunned, and the person I assume to be the leader of their small group tried to persuade me to return while convincing me that working together was more beneficial.

But when he saw that I didn't turn back to answer, he began cursing and calling me names like a traitor of humanity or something, but I ignored him and kept working.

If anyone had seen what happened just now, they might have called me a ruthless person because it was obvious that I had the power and equipment to kill some monsters and help them while doing so but chose not to.

But I don't care what other people think and call me ruthless because I owe nothing to them, especially the people at my back, and if you count the fact that I went out of my way to kill the zombie they were fighting and save their lives in the process, I can say I tried my best.

I'm sure there are some people out there who would simply ignore them because it was 'not their business' in the first place.

And, even though I had no intention of joining them in the first place, something else convinced me that I should not.

Despite their best efforts to hide it, I could tell they were infected from certain parts of their bodies.

While monsters can't turn people into zombies, it appears that zombies can, as evidenced by the blackened area of their skin that was slowly spreading and mutating.

I'm not going to risk my life carrying people who might later attack me when it's completely unexpected.

Looking at the oddly obedient Anna by my side made me think that maybe I only hang out with strong people.

I'm not being biased here because I'm not going to let anything get in the way of my survival.

I still have to eat mom's chicken soup before I die at least.

I turned to face Anna and said,

"Let's look for a safe place to rest," I said, and she nodded as I looked up to the dark rainy skies and saw a familiar scene in the sky.

[Time left: 9 hours, 53 minutes, 39 seconds],